meta

Question 1

intro

Answer 1

Meta-ethics deals with a philosophical analysis of the meaning and character of ethical language. An example are words such as good and bad, hence making meta-ethics important for normative ethics. The development of the Logical Positivist movement lead to a shift from the typically cognitivist view of good observable in ethical naturalism and intuitionism to a more non-cognitivist view, as demonstrated in Ayer’s emotivism and the prescriptivist interpretation of good.

Question 2

divison

Answer 2

cog
ethical naturalism, Bradley
theo, aquinas

intuitionism
moore
prichard
ross

noncog
emotivism, ayer
pres, stevenson

Question 3

ethical/theo naturalism

Answer 3

Morals are objectively true, absolute facts of the natural world

bradley

• caste system
• moral maturation
• place in social organism
• then can follow duty. concrete. leads to ordered society
• good is in terms of property of nat worl

awuinas

• nature
• telos
• pp

foot

• moral evil is nat defect
• can observe virtues, aim at good
• e.g. nature. cycle of maintenance. spot trends and thus defectives etc. same with good

Question 4

ethical nat eval

Answer 4

• mill/darwin, evil in nature
• fall, aug
• hume, good is statement of emotion, naturalistic fallacy (foot avoids this)
• pigden, no meaning
• Mackie, moral rules based on tradition
• Moore, nat fall. open question. good is open question

Question 5

ethical non nat/intuitionism

Answer 5

• Terms ‘good’ and ‘evil’ are objective but indefinable.
• intuition - special form of consciosuness
• must educate, and be aware of bias

moore

• agrees with nat fal
• can observe good but not define e.g. mother teresa
• using facts and intuition, everyone will come to same conclusion
• e.g. yellow

prichard

• different levels of intuition
• difference between general thinking and moral thinking
• conflict resolved by facts. figure out what duty is

rsoss

• right is act, good is intention
• 7 prima facie principles e.g. gratitude and justice (objectively moral truths)

Question 6

analysis of intuitionism

Answer 6

+ ahluwalia, avoids nat fall
+ russell, not all a priori knowledge is mathematic and logical
+ kant, duty (Prichard)
+ Aristotle, intention (ross)

• psychopaths
• ockhams razor
• Nietzsche, ethical colour blindness. moral chaos if good is based on intuition

Question 7

ethical non cog

Answer 7

emotivism, merely expressions of feeling

• ayer, log pos
• moral is non prop so meanignless
• boo hurrah

prescriptivism, Stevenson

• agreed that ayer doesn’t help with moral disagreements
• element to persuade
• from fact comes emotion
• disagreement settled with cognitivist evidence

Question 8

analysis of non cog

Answer 8

ayer is no help for moral disagreements
need concepts of good/bad for society

• Macintyre. can be meaningful, how de we distinguish moral opinion from normal opinion
• macintyre, Stevenson world is unpleasant